The Total WAR Project, Part V: Los Angeles Dodgers

The Total WAR Project is a series of posts Mike and I began back at The Phrontiersman. In each post, we take a look at the biggest competition the Phillies will likely face – within their division, the National League and the American League – and evaluate their offseasons. Have these teams improved? Have they weakened? How good are the Phillies, in terms of WAR, in relation to their closest competition? Well, that last one will be reserved for the final post in the series. For now, we’re setting our sights on our competitors.

We’re using WAR – Wins Above Replacement – exclusively here, as it contains both offensive and defensive evaluations combined into one single, easy-to-use statistic. There are a few iterations of WAR, none differing greatly, and we use the one supplied by Fangraphs for our numbers and projections.

Typically, these posts begin with some sort of allegorical war story to tie in with the team we’re about to evaluate. You want a war story? Go read some of the comments on the last entry in the series, posted by Mike on the Cardinals.

In this episode, we’ll be taking a look at the National League runners-up in two straight seasons, the Los Angeles Dodgers. Shall we?

The Dodgers didn’t really have any super-duperstar performances in 2009. Perhaps Manny Ramirez would have if he hadn’t missed a third of the season being suspended. Who knows? The guy has been ageless. Like Mitt Romney, as Mike would say. Or Rip Torn, as Corey has discovered. Personally, I’m a little stunned that Tom Cruise is turning 48 this July.

ManRam won’t be able to keep it up forever, but his .269/.389/.492 line in 311 plate appearances following the lifting of his suspension shows that he still has plenty of plate discipline and good contact and power for a guy who turns 38 in May.

The real heart of the Dodgers now resides within a young core of players that could bust out into megastardom at any point, even as early as this year. Outfielder Matt Kemp won’t turn 26 until September, but he seems on course for a 30-30 season in 2010, all while playing above average defense at one of the toughest positions on the field in center.

Young phenom Clayton Kershaw is even younger – 22 in a month or so – and had an incredibly successful sophomore year in 2009. Kershaw allowed a league-low 6.3 hits per nine innings pitched, and surrendered just seven homers in 171 innings while striking out 185. His only Achilles heel is that his stuff has so much movement – including his “Public Enemy No. 1” curve – that patient hitters have little trouble drawing walks; Kershaw walked just fewer than five hitters per nine, a dangerously high number.

Behind Kemp and Kershaw, and maybe some continued development from Andre Ethier or a resurgence from Russell Martin, the Dodgers should once more be the favorite to win the NL West. But their hold is slipping, and they may not be the favorites again this time next year.

The Dodgers are a bit lacking in upper-tier minor league talent, so the best production they’ll likely get for this season is from what they’ve already got. ESPN’s Keith Law ranks their system 19 out of 30 for that very reason. It’s not as if that’s a big hindrance, though: this team will hit a lot of home runs, compile some good on-base numbers and be decent defensively. Their relief corps looks to be strong once again, and the losses of Randy Wolf and late-season acquisition Jon Garland probably won’t hurt as badly as the loss of Wolf’s 2009 numbers would indicate. Wolf’s BABIP was at a career low last year, pushing his numbers favorably enough to net him a three-year, $27 million deal with Milwaukee this winter.

So, by rough estimation, the Dodgers are already on the path to slight regression, losing about two wins from ’09 to ’10. They added very little to replace what was leaving, and will seemingly need to rely heavily on internal help to fill out their supporting roles.

Manager Joe Torre, a notorious bullpen abuser, looks like he’ll be running arms out at a heavy pace once again, as just those relievers listed are projected to amass somewhere in the vicinity of 480 innings. That said, it appears Jon Broxton will once again be a stout, dominant force at the back end of that ‘pen. His troubles in the ninth innings of last year’s NLCS Game 4 notwithstanding, Broxton is one of the best short relievers in the game, and he’ll need to be a two- to two-and-a-half-win pitcher to hold that mostly young ‘pen together. Sherrill and Kuo form a formidable one-two lefty punch, and should continue to give lefty batters fits.

Rotation questions exist after Kershaw, however. Billingsley finished his 2009 campaign rather roughly, Padilla is mercurial at best and not as good as his half season in L.A. would suggest (as if we don’t already know that), and Kuroda’s durability could be in question as he enters his age-35 season.

In fairness, Billingsley probably just experienced a blip and should return to his effective ways, but that does not allay the worries that Dodger fans should have three out of five days. The Dodgers’ chances of reaching a third straight NLCS hinge on those rotation arms, as well as rebounds of sorts from Manny and Martin and the continued progression of Kemp and Ethier. Though perhaps my concerns over the rotation are overstated; for sure, the offense looks to be quite well-rounded and should score between 750 and 800 runs (enough to mask a few clunker outings), and Dodger Stadium plays favorably to pitchers.

What I don’t see is a marked improvement over the course of this offseason. The Dodgers will be good. They will win the West and go to the playoffs with designs of overcoming the Philly hurdle and reaching the World Series. On paper, however, this isn’t a team that will accomplish that feat.

Pencil in the Dodgers for 91-71, good for another NL West division title in 2010.

For reals, though, it’s a wonderful stat that takes both offense AND defense into account, and doesn’t have nearly the number of flaws prevalent in batting average, RBI and the like. Give it a shot, you might grow to like it.

And to be clear, WAR would have suggested that the Rays were a strong World Series contender in 2008, and that the Rockies were playoff worthy last year. In 2008, the Rays were the third best team in baseball by WAR, behind only one American League team. The Rockies were the sixth best national league team last year by WAR; not great, but certainly well within the playoff range.

I’m still shocked at the reaction to these posts. WAR isn’t perfect, but it’s very useful for understanding what’s happening on the baseball field. You can ridicule it all you want, but this type of analysis (WAR, WARP, win shares, the list goes on) is being used by front offices all across baseball (and that very likely includes the phillies) and is here to stay. And it’s not just because it’s a fad, it’s because these tools are much better at evaluating players and teams than batting average and RBI. You don’t have to like it, but don’t be small minded and stupid.

Paul, I mentioned this during your last post in the series. It might help if we knew what the Phils WAR was last year. You don’t need to spoil the series and tell us their projected 2010 WAR, but it would give us some context when reading these posts.

Is replacement level based on absolute measures that are maintained among years or does the level of replacement reset every year based on relative league performance?

If the replacement level is based on an absolute measure, then why not predict 93 wins for the Dodgers in 2010 given that their WAR only declines by 1.5 wins? Otherwise, if the replacement level is relative to league performance and you’ve predicted a decrease of 4 wins, does that mean that the base replacement level decreases by 2-3 wins in 2010?

Couldn’t you also base the regression in wins on the pythag expect wins in 2009 instead of the actual wins which would give the Dodgers 98 wins for 2010?

Again, thanks for the writeup. Just trying to learn more about the underpinnings of WAR.